There were reports that the drilling in Leviatan, which is owned by Delek drilling, Ratio, Avner and Nobel Energy, discontinued. The reason given was due to mechanical amortization of the drilling pipes. This will probably delay the extraction of natural gas from this sight. The expectations of the amount of natural gas in Leviatan are estimated between 11.4 Tcf and 21.1 Tcf.

The drilling in Tamar is still in progress and the current expectations are that it will start to produce natural gas for commercial use by the second half of 2013 to Israel’s electric company.

Last week, the Israeli Parliament approved the Sheshinski committee’s taxation plan on the natural gas findings that were found off the shores Israel during 2009-2010. The natural gas findings were found by a consortium of gas and drilling companies including Delek Energy and Israemco.

The Israeli parliament appointed an independent committee headed by Prof. Sheshinski to recommend how, if any, to tax the expected revenues from the Israeli natural gas findings.